I have experienced “ghosting” and not in a romantic relationship, for which you commonly hear the term. I was ghosted by my best friend when I became a mom, and it is not something that happened overnight, but over time, and it hurts just as much. Ghosting is the term commonly used when someone just stops talking to you, and it is like they become a ghost and you never see them or hear from them again, and this can be a common thing when someone becomes a mom.
There are always the stories we hear from moms who seem to lose friends when they become a mom, especially if their friends are not mothers themselves. Lives get pulled in different directions, and there seems to be less in common. When moms get together with their friends, all they can do is talk about their children and stuff related to mom things, which a friend may not be so interested in if they don’t have children of their own. The two find they cannot relate to each other anymore, and instead of trying to make the friendship work, they just part ways to find friends to who they can relate to.
It has to be said that I have never been the person to have a huge group of friends. I have always had one or two close friends and that is about it. Maybe my life has set me up for this because I never had a friend pool to pull from, it was always all or nothing. I met my best friend on my first day of college, and we had so many years of memories and friendships. She was my maid of honor when I got married, and we had been through a lot together.
Then I got pregnant, and there is an important factor at play here, and one that I understand very deeply. We were set to live the best friends' dream because when I was halfway through my first pregnancy, she got pregnant. We were so excited to be doing this together and imagine having our children be best friends too. However, when my baby was born, she was diagnosed with a terminal illness while the baby was in utero. She (very tragically) delivered a stillborn daughter at 20 weeks pregnant. Understandably, this may have been the first crack in the glass of our friendship. As she continues to struggle to conceive, I went on to have three children.
Was there some resentment on her part? Maybe, and I understood that, and every time I called her to tell her I was pregnant, it hurt me a little because I am sure it hurt her. She wanted to be happy for me, but how could it not hurt someone who desperately wanted to have a baby. Every time we got together, I spoke about my kids and what they were doing, and this was likely putting more cracks in our friendship. Slowly, over time, she started ghosting me. I would text her, and it would take her a week to answer me back. Phone calls would go unanswered and this hurt.
See, motherhood is lonely, and she was my only confidant who I could turn to vent. It is very clear that we are in separate places in life, and we have little in common anymore, but I need my best friend. I have not given up hope that we may find our way back to each other one day, but it is not looking good. Now is the time when I have to start facing reality and maybe it is time for me to do some reflecting on myself and put myself out there to try and make some new friends, friends who have children.
She is still my best friend, and I will treasure the relationship we had, but I suspect that it will only be memories and the annual birthday greetings. It feels like a loss, and this may be a feeling that a lot of other moms can relate to. It feels like I am grieving a friendship, and it seems to be made further complicated by what has happened to her. I find myself thinking that I can’t blame her for “dumping” me, because I must be a constant reminder of the pain and anguish she has gone through. However, I also realize that it is not my fault. Everything in life is a season, but I never thought a friendship would be, but maybe part of self-care is realizing when a season has passed and moving on to the next one.
EDITOR'S NOTE: This is a personal essay, and does not reflect Moms.com's views.